Month: July 2005

“It’ll come in a bunch of five, I’ll tell you that much.” is something my fat geography teacher used to say. She was a nasty piece of work, with a chip on her shoulder as big as her enormous arse, which was also the cause of the chip on the shoulder. She ended each lesson with a threat of violence and humiliated anyone who happened, through no obvious fault of their own, to be stupid, clever, pretty, ugly or just pretty ugly.

I could never work out how geography could bring out such strong emotion in a person. This was geography of danish bacon and how rain was made…i.e. bloody boring. (It was the early eighties, for some reason, interesting geography, that of WHERE PLACES ARE, had been taken off the curruiculum). Yet there she stood twice a week, wearing brown clinging jumpers and brown nylon extremely clingy and enormous trousers… (why did geography teachers ALWAYS wear brown clothes?) demanding that one of us tell her how butter production was useful to the pig deliverers or some other uninteresting bollocks or “I’ll give you a bunch of fives in a minute”… or “I’ll give YOU an I don’t know in a minute, IN THE BACKSIDE!”… or “I’ll wallop you in a minute if you don’t know the answer”. Christ. She was horrible.

But little saintly me (for “saintly” read “utter coward”) who never did anything wrong, was never rude to teachers, did everything she was told, tried to melt into the background (until, of course, proper adolescence took over and the “saintly” could be replaced with “twattish and gaga over boys”) always managed to gauge her quite well and avoid her “fat arse wrath”. And she was fairly pleasant with me. As fairly pleasant as a mean spirited old cow can be.

One day, I was in the school’s fast food joint, an outrageous attempt by the school to get us to eat more shit than ever before, leaving the upstairs refectory with its more traditional school food for the saddos, the kids with glasses, the kids whose parents were teachers in the school and the lamos, and the geekoids, and the spazzes. And the dorks. And the wallies. And the nerds. And the swots.

And there I saw the fat arsed bitch from hell. Bringing out with her a reasonably healthy looking lunch of a baked potato. As I drew nearer, to get into the queue for chips with lard sauce, I realized that it wasn’t just one baked potato… it was two… gigantic… baked potatoes. Just at that moment, my adolescent hormones took full control of my brain, kicking the slightly geeky, shy, nice little girl out of my head….

“OI, MISS!… THOSE’LL MAKE YOU FAT!”

Holy mother of god, what did I do that for?

She streaked across the room, as fast as her enormous arse and the enormous arse sized chip on her shoulder and the two enormous baked potatoes would allow….putting out her left arm (the potatoes were safe in the right) she shoved me up against the wall by my neck while lifting me up a good centimetre off the ground. As I was pinned there, she spat horrible words at me, but I have no recollection of them, as my eyes were blacking out with lack of blood to the brain as I tried to think of a grovelling excuse. All the other kids just looked on aghast… but there were no other teachers around (all in the refectory upstairs, I expect, wearing their glasses) to get her off me. When she finally let go and stormed out, I found I had gained a little kudos from the other pre- and peri-adolescents, for finally not being such a damned goody goody. But I still ran off and cried in the loos.

I discovered many years later that she had lost her fat arse and got married and become a nice person. Charming. Bloody charming. Couldn’t she have done that then and spared us the violence and the grief?

A fortnight’s blissful, indolent cottaging beckons, with nothing more arduous than dead-heading the geraniums stretching ahead of me. No plans, no engagements, no commitments. Why, we could just sit with the newspapers in the morning room for the next sixteen days solid, and it wouldn’t matter a jot or a tittle.

There may be blogging ahead. But, on balance, probably not a great deal of it, what with the steam-powered 56k dial-up laptop and all. (It never feels right, unplugging the phone and stretching the cables across the kitchen table. Like some sort of violation of our bucolic, Epicurean ideal.) Besides, as we old lags know from experience, simply nobody reads weblogs in August, darlings.

There will also be a few more Consequences posts, as I’m allowing everyone a maximum of two each, and a couple of people have yet to make their debuts. Good, aren’t they? I do love the sensation of checking my own blog for updates. Saves on travel expenses.

Incidentally, Austria was surprisingly lovely. This was the first time, in seven countries and maybe as many as thirty business trips, where the client has taken the time and trouble to take me out for the evening. Much appreciated, that was. And not only that: because we got through the work so efficiently, I ended up having a few hours to spare in the afternoon. So what did the client do, but take the afternoon off and show me round Vienna? I particularly loved the Schloss Schönbrunn: full-on Viennese old-school style, which straddled the divide between magnificence and kitsch to marvellous effect.

I think I know why I liked Vienna so much. It was like Germany, but with a key added ingredient: style and elegance. And quite the friendliest people I have ever worked with, even if I could barely understand a word of their Austrian dialect. Why, I even enjoyed my Wiener Schnitzel. They’re actually quite nice! Who knew?

Oh, but I’m rambling. Filling in time before the bell rings. Can you tell?

There might be a new podcast this afternoon, but it’s looking less likely now that I have to make an emergency appointment with the dentist. (One of my crowns has wiggled loose, and I’m scared of morphing into Worzel Gummidge halfway through the holiday.)

I would like to say “See this job? This marrow-shaped, festering and pulsating pile of cack that you refer to as my rôle? Do you want to know where you can stick it? Would you like some help getting it in there?”

I would like to say “Nigella? Oh yes, but we’re just good friends.”

But I can’t. And people know this. And take advantage, bastards that they are. So I get most of the following calls:

“I know you’re busy but …”

“So-and-so suggested I ring you because you can help me with …”

“Hi. My name is Michael Smith and I’m calling from the corporate rewards department in Los Angeles to tell you you’ve won the jackpot! Press 9 to claim your prize.”

“Hi. This is Nige again. Sorry about Friday – I’ve got to work. Can you make it on Saturday instead? I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”

1. I actually rang home from my mobile to check what the message was, you bastard. You’ve cost me money. Fly over here and wander over to Norfolk and let’s see what you’ve won in life’s lottery, eh? It’ll come in a bunch of five, I’ll tell you that much.

I was so embarrassed. For a second, I had actually thought about lying. And I hate lying. I was even more embarrassed, in fact, for the fact that had I lied, it would have been the most rubbish lie that ever lay.

I was clearly, you see, holding a cigarette already. Thus to lie, and say ‘I don’t smoke’ would be comedy falsehood. To lie and say ‘I’m sorry, this is the last of my tobacco’ would sound like truth, and would therefore be worse. I hate lying. Plus – I’m really bad at it. He’d only asked for a cigarette, after all. And who can deny another human being one cobble on the path to lung cancer if you happen to have one on you? If they ask nicely, that is?

Anyway, the more society hates us, the more we smokers seem to feel that we should band together, so it’s imperitive that, in a times of nicotine need, we do each other these small acts of kindness.

I’m thinking of giving up smoking. You may have got that from the little cancer pebble I dropped in the post-pond earlier on. I’m thinking of giving up smoking because I always said I would stop if I didn’t enjoy it any more. And I don’t, not so much. Also my lungs kind of ache. And I get out of breath. And I don’t like being addicted. And I hate the smell.
But I like the nicotine.
Oh the quandry.

There are other reasons, also, for giving up. And they were brought home to me sharply the other day by the man who asked me for a cigarette.

He asked me for a cigarette, and I was embarrassed, because I almost said no. He was homeless, and he was smelly. And also a little off his face. But I had a cigarette, and so I couldn’t say no, because it would have been a lie. The thing is about rolling your own, though, is after you’ve said yes you can have a cigarette, there’s then between thirty seconds and a minute while you roll one. And that’s enough time to strike up a big old conversation. By the time the fag was rolled and handed over, John – his name was John – had taken a shine to me (on the spur of the moment my name was ‘Clare’) and my beloved (his name was ‘Bob’).

To be fair, his name actually IS Bob, but it still sounds made up when you say it.

John was pretty charming, when he wasn’t mentioning “That five stretch for GBH” that he did. We talked about the difference in begging income in – “Nah, nah, nah hang on, it weren’t GBH, it were aggrivated assault, that one” – ah, right, thanks. Great. Where was I? – in West London “full of Paddys, they’re f**kin great, Paddys“, and North East London… “s’full of, wew, you kna, don’t you, eh?” – No, actually, I have no idea. Apparently in the four hours he’d been sat on Newington Green, he’d made £6. In West London he would have made £50. As a West Londoner by birth, I kind of felt proud. Or sort of.

We talked about his brother, who had got out of prison for a total of four days before being arrested again (it was John’s fault, he said, he was a bit sorry, but his bruvver deserved it) and his sister, who is a police officer. We talked about his 19 years on the streets, and the best way to get to Dalston at that time of night on buses where he wouldn’t have to pay. We talked about the importance, in this life, of “‘avin’ a bubble“. He said I was a bubble. He congratulated my beloved on me. He said my beloved was lucky to have a missus who was such a bubble.
Not speaking cockney rhyming slang, I was confused about this for a couple of days. I couldn’t work out what I’d done that was quite so pleasingly spherical and soapy.

The bus took a very, very, very long time to come.
A very, very long time.

And I wouldn’t have minded, but for the hugs and kisses on the cheek he bestowed on me. While touching in their honest (if incredibly inebriated) affection, they made me feel stinky. And the with the smoking, I was already stinky. So then I was stinky times two.

When the bus came, and I stood there, smelling a little of smoke, and a little of man sweat and ground-in Super-Tennants, I decided I should probably giving up smoking. Because enjoyable as surprise conversations can be, I like to have a little control over them. And just once, if someone walked up and asked me if I had a cigarette, I would like not to lie. I would like not to be hugged and tagged with the super-strength-lager peff. I would like not to be mean, and not to lie, I would like to smile, and say sorry.

I’d started the day at home, Chez Sal (sea shalls), as is my wont, with my feet up on a steaming cup of tea, perusing the Sunday papers hungover in my usual Wednesday morning attempt to come up to speed with the week. I gave it up as a bad job halfway through page one. Too many words. I essayed “Hello!” magazine and gave it up halfway through page one. Too many turds. “Front”, too many birds. “Ornithology Today”, too– hey, there’s a coincidence.

I rapidly came to the conclusion there was too much of everything.

Well, when I say “rapidly,” I mean more in the sense of the third cup of tea and second eye-opener.

I looked at my watch. Good lord. I was wearing a verb. Pants? Same. Jacket? Ick. Pass the tissues. Coat? Quite. I swiftly di-vested myself of my shirt to maintain grammatical consistency and sprang to my feet with a spring in my in-step. I paced the floor. 20 feet by 15.

Not good enough.

I needed reading matter of even lighter weight than “Hello!” and “Front.”

Not an easy task.

With me, as you know, or at least you do now, the thought is the deed.

I couldn’t think of anything.

Thus I stood there for a bit.

The phone rang. This put me in a difficult position. It was quite loud and right behind me, you see, and I was still feeling rather delicate, so when it rang the second time, I observed it wide-eyed from the light fitting I now clung to on the ceiling. As I mournfully debated my options at this height, traditional British workmanship saved the day and on the third ring, I stood up from the pile of rubble and dust next to the phone and answered it debonairly.

“Chez Sal.”

“Say that three times fast.”

“That that that.”

“Hang on, there’s someone knocking at the door, I’ll ring you back.”

“No, you fool, that was me.”

“What?! Well, stop mucking around and come in, then. There’s no time to waste.”

I opened the door and sauntered into his office.

“You probably should have put the phone down first, you know.”

We gazed briefly but pensively at the cord running out his door and down the street in the direction of my house.

“You really should get a mobile phone, Sal.”

“I have one of those too. But anyway, ALL phones are mobile.”

“Not public phones. They’re fixed in place.”

“They must be mobile, otherwise: how would they have got there in the first place?”

“Good point.”

“That puts me up 180 points to 17, doesn’t it?”

“I’m biding my time for my comeback.”

“You have one?”

“…”

“So, why am I here? What urgent matter requires the presence of Sal?” I struck a pose, which got angry and gave chase. Now, I don’t really like chase, but I didn’t want to be rude, so I thanked it and put the chase in my pocket, where it started to run. Which explained all those pants. I hoped they stayed pants and not stains.

“I need a book.”

“There’s a coincidence.”

“So it is.”

We gazed briefly and pensively at the coincidence in the corner.

“You don’t see many of those nowadays.”

“Funny, I was saying the exact same thing just this morning.”

“Well, anyway, back to the book. As you know, the Dr Fu Manchu Philanthropic and Totally Not Evil Association’s Christmas-In-July Party is coming up and they want to reserve Wembley Stadium for the pre-dinner drinks session. Something about preferring a grassy surface to save on the cleaning up. But… well… we fear nefarious prior booking may have occurred. I have heard rumours, Sal, dark rumours. And the name whispered in hushed and frightened tones is always the same.

“Mrs. Elspeth Groatington-Smythe.”

Each syllable fell like lead, yet the name hung in the air.

Groatington-Smythe. Mrs.

My arch enemy.

We’d been mortal foes ever since the Gastric le-Frux Town Fête’s WI Spiced Cake Stall Crisis of 1974. I hadn’t been there nor been involved in any way –I’ve never even heard of it before I mentioned it just now, to be honest– but I, Sal Tation, stand for Justice in all its forms. It makes my life damn difficult from time to time, but I can not stand by and see injustice dealt to the helpless and weak, the forgotten downtrodden, the volunteer groups’ spiced cake bakers of this world. But Groatington-Smythe was no pushover. A merciless, implacable enemy of all that was good and right, she. We battled not just the once, but again, and again. Each time, she escaped justice with her animal cunning, genius intellect, powerful frame, and supernaturally strong ginger biscuits. Fiendish plots, frenzied baking, and barely-escapable deathtraps were her stock in trade. Why, I can remember when…

But this is not the time.

“Tell me more.”

And the story unfolded. The only way to determine whether Wembley Stadium was booked for the 5-7pm first sitting on Friday was to track Groatington-Smythe (Mrs.) down to her lair, penetrate it as no one had ever penetrated Groatington-Smythe (Mrs.) before, find her heavily defended secret underground library, and inspect the book’s page for Friday to see what Wembley’s Maitre d’ had written.

At last.

A plan.

I sprang into action. “Action” is the name of my shower. I’m no good at all until I’ve had my shower.

Refreshed, I put a spot of Sal-talcion, then I got into my Sal-suit, donned my Sal-utility belt, climbed into the Sal-mobile, and tore off in a cloud of Sal-rubber. With my Sal-sexlife, you see, there are always so many used rubbers that lots escape even the most fastidious of cleaners. And, to be frank, the most fastidious of cleaners resign pretty bloody quickly after starting at Chez Sal, so I’m left with the dregs, not just in terms of cleaners but also in terms of random refuse lying about the place.

But all that was behind me now as I set off on my Quest to Save the Dr Fu Manchu Philanthropic and Totally Not Evil Association’s Christmas-In-July Party’s Friday Early Booking!

The story’s for another time, I’m not being paid for this. It is one of wonder, of high adventure and high risks, of nail-biting hair’s-breadth escapes from certain doom as I sped about the globe, of crossing the Andes (which I regret to this day– if you think it’s a light matter to be trailed ever since by the world’s longest and highest (in terms of distance from the centre of the earth) mountain range screaming red revenge in its volcanic basalt heart, I can only shake my head and pray you never need learn better), of endless false leads and endlessly renewed detective work, of shady contacts in shady bars, of old connections and old favours, of deals struck and deals broken, before finally tracking down the arch-fiend later that afternoon to her new lair in the deepest darkest most god-forsaken reaches of the Chiltern Hills, unknown to man nor beast, apart from the local Ramblers Association and the Number 15 bus.

From a gentle cruising speed of 280mph (damn school zones), I slewed the Sal-mobile to a broadside halt in a convenient parking space outside at the end of a 100-yard four-wheel locked-brake skid and a shower of tortured rubber. Surprisingly sticky, those things. Tenacious. Like me. Groatington-Smythe (Mrs.) had met her match. But not at Wembley. Not if I had anything to do with it!

I consulted the Secret Lair Plans I’d purchased surreptitiously from a little stereotypeman in the stereotype quarter of a far away stereotype.

And entered the Lair.

I won’t bore you with the details. I’m sure you all have lots to do.

In what seemed like no time, but in fact took about 40 years off my life and added several years to my sentence, I’d overpowered the guards, scaled the walls, cracked the safe to discover the secret combination written down inside to let me open it to find the key inside to the front door to let me in, cured cancer and all known diseases, sneaked past a contingent of 12,000 heavily armed soldiers, run away from 12,000 heavily legged soldiers, eaten my lunch, caught cancer, delved the upper cave system, penetrated the lair via the usual succession of deathtraps, and found and entered the library.

At last, the library. A large silent cavern, stalactites and stalagmites twinkling overhead in the harsh halogen lights as they argued about which had to get down. And behind the stern, forbidding Enquiries Desk was my goal. I laughed when I saw the final deathtrap, the last obstacle between me and triumph. How tedious. The old Keep It At The Bottom of A Bottomless Pit Of Radioactive Tigers With Only A Burning Rope Leading Down trick. This was last year’s black.

I sprang into action. And by god, I needed it. I stank.

Refreshed, I bounded over the lip of the pit and swarmed hand-over-hand down the burning rope towards the ravening jaws of the radioactive tigers prowling around the book –the Book!– lying open to Friday’s page on the plinth in the middle.

Probably, like the curate’s egg, parts of it are excellent. I mean, I’m sure he’s very persuasive with the customers and makes them place orders for a load of flanges and associated industrial goods, and other exciting things that the company we both work for deal in. And I daresay he’s excellent at other things salespeople traditionally excel at, such as driving his company-issue Ford Sierra down the middle lane of the motorway at 65mph, making useful contacts on the golf course, and braying loudly into his mobile phone while striding self-importantly around the office. They send salespeople on training courses to teach them this sort of stuff, you know. So I’m sure those parts of our up-and-coming sales rep Dave Pearson’s performance are entirely up to scratch. Excellent, in fact.

But I don’t care. I’m only a lowly sales office clerk, you see, so really it doesn’t matter to me and my ilk how many flanges Dave Pearson sells- it’s not like I’m on commission or anything. No, all we lowly clerks care about is that the sales reps send us in their paperwork on time, so that when the customers’ orders come into the office they are nice and easy to put on. Ideally in fact we would like to get all our work done by lunchtime, so that we can spend the rest of our 9-5 life engaged in interesting and constructive behaviour, like writing on our weblogs (and sometimes on other people’s). The sales reps we like are the ones who give us no bother, do their paperwork on time, and if they manage to sell some flanges along the way, well all well and good. I suppose they need to sell a few, just enough to keep us all in a job. Ultimately all we ask for is an easy life.

But guess what- Dave Pearson, the sales rep assigned to me in my new department, is not the sort of sales guy who gives you an easy life. Quite the opposite- he sells a great amount of flanges, causing unholy amounts of customer orders to come piling on to my desk out of the fax machine at all hours of the day. But because he hasn’t done his paperwork these orders become untidy and time-consuming to process. Hell, sometimes I even have to resort to ringing up the customers and talking to them in order to see what they want! Is this why I embarked on a career in customer service? Is it heckers like, as they used to say on Coronation Street. I entered a career in customer service because it seemed a whole damn lot easier than secondary school teaching, which is what I did before. And I stayed (embarrassing as it may be to admit) for the money (which is not bad, considering) and for the skiving opportunities (which are ample, or at least they are when they give you a salesperson who will play ball, Goddamit).

So anyway, I decided to confront Dave Pearson about his missing paperwork. Well not literally, as this would involve hanging around on a golf course somewhere, or standing in the middle lane of the M62 and waiting for him coming along in his Ford Sierra. Instead I sent him an email. Quite a friendly one, along the lines of ‘hi there Dave, if you have the time maybe you could send me in these prices I had asked for’. But of course I didn’t get an answer, so I sent another one, slightly more abrupt-and still heard nothing. And so I sent a third, really quite abrupt this time to the point of almost rudeness. ‘Dave- I really need a reply now. Please respond..’- this time copying in his boss. This one got a response, in the form of a phone call.

And of course Dave was the very soul of contrition. ‘Oh Jonathan, I’m so sorry- I’ve really let you down here. Look, I promise I’ll get the thing across to you start of play tomorrow, and you can do what you have to do, mate’. Well all right then, that’s more like it, I thought. Only the next day came and there was nothing. Then the day after that, and the day after that. This, I began to think- is getting beyond a joke. This bloke is just taking the piss.

I suppose at this stage I should have just rang with a gentle reminder. Maybe took the piss myself a bit. ‘Hey Dave, I know you’re probably busy at the 19th hole there, but if you could just get those prices across I might be able to get on with my damn job here….’ That would probably have done the trick. But the day in question I was feeling tired (I had been up half the night writing consequences post number 15, if you must know) and, well, just maybe a trifle ratty and irrational. So I didn’t ring up, I emailed again. And copied in his boss again. As well as his boss’s boss, and my immediate manager, just for good measure. And also the bloke who sits next to me- I can’t even remember why, I was having an attack of self-righteous office rage and I wanted everyone to know about it.

Needless to say this fourth missive was couched in the least measured terms you can possibly imagine. ‘Dave, despite your promises of last week I have still not received this information. You certainly don’t need me to tell you we do not need to give this customer any excuses not to pay their invoices. Your immediate response is required. Regards, Jonathan’.

Within minutes I got a written reply. A very short one. Terse would be more the word. ‘Prices attached. Hope you didn’t miss anyone off your copy list. Dave’.

That was a couple of days ago now- but the thing is this: I just can’t get this short but sharp rebuke out of my head. I will be washing the dishes or something and it will re-emerge- ‘hope you didnt miss anyone off your copy list’.

Damn I’ve really upset him, haven’t I? And he’s not a bad bloke really, big City fan and all. And now I’ve made him an enemy. And workplaces are awful, gossipy environments in which enmity can fester, as we all know. So soon I’m into full neurotic overdrive. ‘Oh dear God, he’s going to have it in for me now and probably all the rest of them will join in- oh what the hell have I done? No, it’s no good, I’m just going to have to hand my notice in and be done with it. It’s the dole office for me on Monday for sure- or back to the teaching lark. Oh, God in heaven help me!’

Oh I’m probably making too much of it all, I know. Cheerful Dave Pearson himself has probably forgotten about his own angry email already. But I still wish I had just picked the damn phone up. I’m supposed to just want an easy life, as I think I was just saying. So why do I have to make things so damn difficult for myself?

I have very firm views of what ‘stupid’ is. I suspect that the most precise definition would be ‘not me’.

Sometimes it’s what they say. Or what they do. Or what they don’t say. Or fail to do. Or just the way they are. Or their persona.

The way I see it, it is the 21st Century. We live in an information-rich society. When I were a lass we had to go to the library to find out information, and then read it by candlelight. Now we have computers and the internet, with its own internal lighting system…

But part of me still blames Elton John and David Furnish for the end of the best relationship I have ever had.

I really wanted to write the meaningless sex post. Not that I’ve had any sex – meaningless or meaningful or otherwise – in the past few weeks. Too stupid, you see. Or if I had, I don’t think I’d be blogging it. Especially not on Troubled Diva’s blog. Good grief, no. That would never do. Although I reckon if you had a scandalous shag, the best place to write about it would be on someone else’s blog.

But, exactly how do you blog sex? “I lay there and he moved towards me with a towering pulsating tumescence which he clinically inserted into my BBC journalists look away now.”

Or how would that read in txt msg “He fkd me i scrmd he cme i dt thr woz a wtpth he fl aslp n snrd i ly awk thn i ndd 2 p” Mills and Boon, you know my e-addy.

But the really strange thing about sex is, the stupid people manage to do it. It has always fascinated me, how did people know in the old days. I think I found out by watching TV, coupled with tittle-tattle with the girls gathered round the sandpit. But, in the old days they didn’t have sandpits. And yet you hear even in this day and age of couples who don’t understand why they can’t conceive, and it turns out he’s been sticking it in her belly-button.

I digress, as always. It’s hard this is, as the actress said to the bishop.

I always feel there’s a story waiting to be told, about the actress and the bishop. Probably, like the curate’s egg, parts of it are excellent.